Aircraft operators (e.g., pilot and co-pilot) may communicate with one or more air traffic controllers or aircraft via text messages. Generally, the text messages transmitted by the pilot of the aircraft to the one or more air traffic controllers or aircraft may be displayed on a display module disposed in the cockpit of the aircraft.
FIG. 1 illustrates a conventional message inbox 100 displayed on a display module 101 disposed in the cockpit of an aircraft. The message inbox 100 may include a receive queue 104. Text messages 102 received from the one or more air traffic controllers may be displayed in the receive queue 104. The message inbox 100 may also display the contents 114 of a selected text message 102. One or more commands 120, each corresponding to one or more push-buttons 118, may also be displayed on the display module 101 and a command 120 may be selected by pressing the corresponding push-button 118 disposed adjacent thereto.
FIG. 2 illustrates a conventional transmit status page 200 that may be displayed on the display module 101. For example, the transmit status page 200 may be displayed by pressing the push-button 118 adjacent the command “XMIT STATUS.” The transmit status page 200 may list text messages 202 that may have been transmitted by the pilot to the one or more air traffic controllers. However, once the text message has been transmitted, the pilot may not be able to view the contents thereof. Additionally, the transmitted text messages and any received text messages may not be displayed simultaneously (e.g., side-by-side) on the display module. As a result, the pilot may have to switch the display on the display module between the transmitted text messages and the received text messages to view the desired text messages, which may be inconvenient.
What is needed, then, is a system for simultaneously displaying the transmitted and received text messages, and also displaying the contents of previously transmitted text messages.